Sunday, 2 February 2014

Dominoes, with books.

Here's a game I played with Justin Landon of Staffer's Book Reviews - the rules should be self-apparent:

(you will note it's the first non-trivial word that counts, not 'the' or 'a' etc)(plurals and singular don't match but you can ignore apostrophes)(single world titles match both ways)(paper books only)[contest has ENDED - though you can still have your efforts included]

And here's the longest chain I could make with books I own:

To reverse a title, turn the book upside down. So here we have: Lord:Lord/High:High/Deryni:Deryni/Rising:RisingWhat's the longest chain you can make? Send me a photo & I'll put it here. The best one will win a FANTABULOUS prize! Send me your entry at empire_of_thorns@yahoo.co.uk

7? From Anita

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo / The Girl Who Played With Fire / Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire / Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince / Prince of Thorns / King of Thorns / A Clash of Kings

'King' and 'Kings' don't match at the end, so it's a 6, but it still beats me!8! From Vanessa.

Dreaming the Eagle / Eagle and the Raven / the Raven Queen / Queen of the Amazons / Last of the Amazons / the Last King / King of Thorns / Prince of Thorns

So this uses Swedish books (which is fine) and matches 'kung' to 'king' which I'll allow since they're the same word, but it also matches compound words 'onskasang' to 'sang' which is a step too far. So really it's a valiant 6 - which still beats me, but not Garrett.

11? From Harry

The Final Empire / Empire in Black and Gold / Storm of Swords /The Gathering Storm / A Gathering of Light / The Light of Burning Shadows / The Way of Shadows / The Way of Kings / The Last Argument of Kings / Last and First Men / The Sum of All MenI've ruled against tablets but since we have a 12 and a 20 below the point is moot!

Prince of Thorns / King of Thorns / Magician King / Magician / Magician: Apprentice / Assassin's Apprentice / Assassin of Gor / Blood Brothers of Gor / Prince of the Blood / Prince of Chaos / Lord of Chaos / Lord of Castle Black / Black Sun Rising / The Rising / The Shadow Rising / Shadow of a Dark Queen / Queen of Blood / Reign of Blood / To Reign in Hell / When We Join Jesus in Hell / When True Night Falls / Darkness Falls / Lost in Darkness / Last Exit for the Lost / The last Dark / Dark of the Sun / Book of the New Sun / Book of the Short Sun / Midnight Sun / Towers of Midnight / The Two Towers / The Two Dead Girls / Bull Running for Girls

OK, I'm impressed! There's a quibble over Magician / Magician: Apprentice being the same book, but if they are then it's still a 32.

39! Doug

The Gathering Storm : Storm of Swords : Crown of Swords : Crown of Shadows : Lord of Snow and Shadows : The High Lord : High Deryni : Deryni Rising : Black Sun Rising : The Black Unicorn : The Last Unicorn : Last Call : First Rider's Call : The First Dragon : Dragon Prince:Prince of the Blood :The Blood King : King of Thorns : Prince of Thorns : Prince of Demons : Queen of Demons : Shadow of a Dark Queen : Shadow Moon : Fool Moon : Golden Fool : The Golden City : City of the Lost : Lost in a Good Book : The Book of Three : The Drawing of the Three : Drawing Out the Dragons : The Shadow Dragons : The Shadow Rising : The Dark is Rising : Dark River : River of Gods : American Gods : An American Tragedy42? Tracy

Seeker / Angel seeker (reversed) / Night angel / White night (reverse) / White dragon / Dragon Prince / Prince of thorns / King of thorns (reversed) / King of Dreams / City of lost dreams (reversed) / City and the City / City at the end of time / Time of the dark / Dark man / Hollow man (reversed) / Hollow City / City in winter / Wolf of winter (reversed) / Wolf speaker / Speaker for the dead / The book of the dead (reversed) / Book of the Mad / Mad ship / Ship if magic / Magic in the blood / Blood of Dragons / City of dragons (reversed) / City of Sorcery / Queen of Sorcery (reversed) / Honor of the queen (reversed) / Witch queen (reversed) / Witch world / World without end / Magicians end (reversed) / (The Magicians by Grossman goes here, I haven't found where it's currently at yet.) / Magicians apprentice / Assassins apprentice (reversed) (Hobb) / Kronor the Assassins (reversed) / Kronor the betrayal / Betrayal in winter / Winter rose / Rose daughter / Daughter of the blood / Promise of Blood (reversed) (McClellan) (not shown cause I just thought of it:-)Promise of Blood & The Magicians not counted in the 42....however Honor of the Queen appears to be matching both ways ... so it's 'only' 29.Probably salvageable into something longer than 29 though.

52! Michael

With the last hours ticking away are we looking at our winner with this 2nd bite at the cherry by Michael? (photo sent in high res with titles readable)

The Gathering Storm : Storm of Swords : Crown of Swords : Crown of Shadows : Lord of Snow and Shadows : The High Lord : High Deryni : Deryni Rising : Black Sun Rising : The Black Unicorn : The Last Unicorn : Last Call : First Rider's Call : The First Dragon : Dragon Prince : Prince of the Blood :The Blood King : King of Thorns : Prince of Thorns : Prince of Demons : Queen of Demons : Shadow of a Dark Queen : Shadow Moon : Fool Moon : Golden Fool : The Golden City : City of the Lost : Lost in a Good Book : The Book of Three : The Drawing of the Three : Drawing Out the Dragons : The Shadow Dragons : The Shadow Rising : The Dark is Rising : Dark River : River God : God's War : The Paradise War : Trouble in Paradise : Trouble On Cloud City : City of the Dead : King of the Dead : King's Dragon : Dragon Rule : Wizard's Fist Rule : Witch & Wizard : Winter Witch : The Dragons of Winter : Winter Prey : Night Prey : Dragons of Winter Night : Night's Daughter : Daughter of the Empire : Servant of the Empire : Servant of the Dragon : Red Dragon : Red Shadows : Plague of Shadows : The Emperor's Plague : The Emperor's Knife : Knife of Dreams : Dust of Dreams : Graveyard Dust : The Graveyard Book : The Book of Lost Things : The God of Small Things : The Scourge of God : Scourge of the Betrayer

Is there a time limit on this, or can I go out and trawl the second hand bookshops for obscure titles eg "The Penguin's engine" to bridge a gap in my chain!

Also I take it we are looking for an exact word match (i.e. not plurals king/kings but apostophes are ok eg king/king's)

Have searched the main bookshelves for likely titles and am regretting the last export to the second hand shop which removed a load of titles of dubious literary merit, but versatile book domino potential!

I'm not sure how your plan would work... say you had Lord of Destruction and Tower Lord - put them together and you then need to find a book starting/ending with 'Destruction' on one side and on the other a book starting /ending with 'Tower'... another book with 'Lord' in the title wouldn't get you anywhere...